'Game of Thrones' cast covers Vanity Fair: HBO producers reveal they know how the book series will end

The cast of 'Game of Thrones' on the April 2014 cover of Vanity Fair. (Annie Leibovitz exclusively for Vanity Fair)

Want to know how "Game of Thrones" ends? Well, so do the producers of the HBO series, which begins its fourth season in April.

George R. R. Martin, the author of "A Song of Ice and Fire" book series that the show is based on, is notoriously secretive about how the fantasy books will end. But producers David Benioff and D.B. Weiss managed to get a broad outline, they told Vanity Fair.

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"Last year we went out to Santa Fe for a week to sit down with (Martin) and just talk through where things are going, because we don't know if we are going to catch up and where exactly that would be," Benioff said to the magazine.

"If you know the ending, then you can lay the groundwork for it. And so we want to know how everything ends. We want to be able to set things up. So we just sat down with him and literally went through every character," Benioff added.

The producers of HBO's 'Game of Thrones' know only the broad outlines of how the book series their show is based on will end. (Macall B. Polay/HBO)

In a series that has no qualms with killing off main characters, that information likely includes which of the key players survive the show.

"I can give them the broad strokes of what I intend to write, but the details aren't there yet," Martin said. "I'm hopeful that I can not let them catch up with me."

Wrapping up the epic series is not that far out of sight either, the producers said. Benioff and Weiss told the magazine that they hope to wrap the show up after "seven or eight seasons."

Emilia Clarke as Daenerys Targaryen in 'Game of Thrones.' The show''s producers would like the series to wrap afer seven or eight easons. (Macall B. Polay/HBO)

"I think the desire to milk more out of it is what would eventually kill it, if we gave in to that."

The show's ending might disappoint one of the show's biggest fans, President Barack Obama. Benioff and Weiss confirmed that Obama gets screeners of the show to see before they premiere.